Weeds
by Tendo Rei
Summary: Dolores has always loved gardening, and the young minds of Hogwarts are very much like tender budding sprouts aren't they? But every garden has its weeds...


**Weeds**

_Disclaimer: I do not own the characters herein, please do not sue me forthwith._

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Dolores has always loved gardening. She loves shaping, tending, pruning the young shoots and branches, loves making it turn out absolutely _perfect_.

The same with young minds. Each walk through the halls is like a stroll through the rows, a riot of color and form. She loves shaping young minds as well.

Young Ramsbottom has a question.

"Please ma'am. Aren't vampires people too, ma'am?"

She purses her lips. An errant branch. Well, she knows what she must do with such untidy thinking, doesn't she?

Young Ramsbottom leaves the classroom in tears.

It's true, all fresh young minds are like the delicate greenery of her garden but in every garden there were…_weeds._

One of the many Weasleys jogs her shoulder, giving her a cheeky look and running off before she can do anything. Yes, far too many of the Weasley bunch, and they all had that _defiant_ streak. Nothing was harder to get rid of than pernicious weeds, growing and multiplying, stealing the nourishment from those residing in her garden by right.

Then, of course, there are some weeds that are hard to cut back. Miss Granger catches her eye during the lesson and gives her a defiant stare. Only Miss Granger could have turned learning into an act of rebellion. Nose always stuck in a book, as if that gave you full right to run the world! Why, in _her_ day, girls had never been so…unfeminine. Yet Miss Granger was tough, and had roots deeper in the school than any other common vulgaris.

The only option then, sadly, is to go for the weed killer. She smiles and shrugs and feeds them gentle poison, day in and day out, making sure they never get a foothold in _her_ classroom. She must be careful to do it with a smile. Always careful.

The Boy is worst.

Rude, loud, outspoken, he towers above the other students like a king thistle. Height-wise he's somewhere in the middle, but he makes his presence known and then some. He bristles at her every attempt to culture him into a better fit, a joke, really, but Dolores has too soft of a heart to let him go and reach for the pruning shears. Besides, _he_ might see.

The Potter boy was rather like an expensive and exotic yet repulsive plant received from a relative or close friend. She made a great show of tending it in anybody else's presence, but all alone she would clip the leaves, one by one. No one could say she wasn't giving it the best of care, she _was_…just not all the time.

Weeds do two things: they gather in clumps where your favorite plants are, digging their roots stubbornly in and refusing to be coaxed out; then once established, they send little threads of dissonance across the entire plot. You notice little sprouts where you haven't planted anything. Neville Longbottom used to be such a nice boy. Quiet. Timid.

_Obedient._

Poor young Montague had such a terrible time with the Weasley clump. As did all of her bright young sprouts. Malfoy, Parkinson, Zabini. She cherished their bright smiles, their neat mannerisms compared to the unkempt…_wildness_ of the Weasleys and their two friends.

She strolled through the halls, through the rows, marveling at her handiwork. The absolute prim neatness of the student's dress, the beautiful uniformity of the children's glum faces, she loved to see it all. She loved it when her hard work produced results.

Oh…but here, a small snag.

She had trimmed little Miss Summerisle's straying branches, and there was minor trauma, of course. But she had (however temporarily) forgotten that in this illustrious garden, there were _two_ gardeners.

Albus stood towering over the girl in robes of Prussian blue, his words indistinct at this distance but his tone low and soothing. Her piggy nose screws up at this revolting sight.

Her fellow gardener, whom she had to endure no matter what Fudgesy tried, was very fond of weeds. He was the type of man who, catch him in the right mood, would walk in his own patch and others, sowing seeds with careless abandon. He encouraged weeds.

Miss Summerisle sniffed and nodded, her face aglow with joy at something Albus had told her. A trickle of cold fury washed down Dolores's body.

After all her hard work, tidying the paths, making sure every plant bloomed on schedule, he hurled through it like a windstorm, upsetting everything again. It was _impossible_ to get any work done in this place!

She put a hand to her chins, considering.

…He simply _had_ to go.

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_Author's Note: she's absolutely vicious, isn't she? This scary little peek into Umbridge's head struck me one day, how many people do horrible things because by their logic they are in the right, when actually it's quite the opposite. The gardening metaphor just sort of assembled itself as I thought out the story, and it made perfect sense to use it. And no, 'Fugesy' is not a misspelling, I just thought it would be the kind of revolting nickname a woman like her would use. Might do another one soon, cheers mate!_


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